Barnbougle, whom he at the same time challenged, according to a custom then not altogether abrogated, to prove his innocence in single combat. The king having granted the necessary licence, the fight took place in the royal park, near the palace; and, to the surprise of all assembled, young Bruntfield fell under the powerful sword of his adversary. The intelligence was communicated to his mother at Craighouse, where she was found in her darkened chamber, prostrate before an image of the Virgin. The priest who had been commissioned to break the news, opened his discourse in a tone intended to prepare her for the worst; but she cut him short at the very beginning with a frantic exclamation—“I know what you would tell—the murderer’s sword has prevailed, and there are now but two instead of three, to redress their father’s wrongs!” The melancholy incident, after the first burst of feeling, seemed only to have concentrated and increased that passion by which she had been engrossed for so many years. She appeared to feel that the death of her eldest son only formed an addition to that debt which it was the sole object of her existence to see discharged. “Roger,” she said, “will have the death of his brother, as well as that of his father, to avenge. Animated by such a double object, his arm can hardly fail to be successful.” Roger returned about two years after, a still handsomer, more athletic, and more accomplished youth than his brother. Instead of being daunted by the fate of Stephen, he burned but the more eagerly to wipe out the injuries of his house with the blood of Moubray. On his application for a licence being presented to the court, it was objected by the crown lawyers, that the case had been already closed by _mal fortune_ of the former challenger. But while this was the subject of their deliberation, the applicant caused so much annoyance and fear in the court circle, by the threats which he gave out against the enemy of his house, that the king, whose inability to procure respect either for himself or for the law is well known, thought it best to decide in favour of his claim. Roger Bruntfield, therefore, was permitted to fight in barras with Moubray; but the same fortune attended him as that which had already deprived the widow of her first child. Slipping his foot in the midst of the combat, he reeled to the ground, embarrassed by his cumbrous armour. Moubray, according to the barbarous practice of the age, immediately sprang upon and despatched him. “Heaven’s will be done!” said the widow, when she heard of the fatal incident; “but _gratias Deo!_ there still remains another chance.”